It's a newsletter and a web site!
Nobody does a better job of reminding us that movies are always in the present tense, no matter how long ago they were made, than movie historian, critic, and (above all) enthusiast Leonard Maltin, who's celebrating the fifth anniversary of his own, personal movie-zine, "Leonard Maltin's Movie Crazy" ("A Newsletter for People Who Love Movies"). That's right -- it's a newsletter. As in, printed on paper and snail-mailed to you. The "Collector's Corner" of the most recent issue (which just arrived in my mailbox today), appropriately features some vintage promotional envelopes -- one from RKO studios, and one "Direct From Location" in Old Tucson, AZ, for Wesley Ruggles' "Arizona," starring Jean Arthur. I love Jean Arthur. Almost as much as Barbara Stanwyck.
Though he also has a web site (and writes a "Journal" -- not a blog!), I love that someone of Leonard's stature still puts out a good, analog-style newsletter. (Could we consider it "artisanal"?) But, of course, it's also perfectly in character for Leonard, someone whose passion for movies has always been deeply personal as well as professional. (I take pride in getting Leonard on the web in the first place. He used to fax his weekly columns to me at Cinemania Online, which was a bit "klugey," as we used to say. So, I went to his house and set him up on e-mail in 1996 or so. Leonard was an ebay early-adopter -- for his astounding collection of movie memorabilia, of course -- and once he discovered e-mail, he took to it like a sprocket to celluloid.)
The new issue features an interview with 92-year-old Leslie Martinson, a television director and former MGM script supervisor who worked for Vincente Minnelli, John Huston, Sam Wood, Rouben Mamoulian and others, and who has plenty of stories to tell -- including anecdotes about Gene Kelly and Fred Astaire.
"Long before I had any real awareness of directors and their careers, I knew the name Leslie H. Martinson," Leonard writes, recalling his days as a budding auteurist. "No one who watched television in the 1950s and '60s could have avoided seeing that name. It was emblazoned on countless TV shows, ranging from "Topper" and "The Millionaire" to every Warner Bros. show imaginable, when that studio dominated the airwaves..." Martinson directed episodes of such series as "Maverick," "Hawaiian Eye," "77 Sunset Strip," "Mannix," "Mission: Impossible," "ChiPs," and "Dallas" -- and some movies, too ("Lad: A Dog," "PT 109," the 1966 feature "Batman," based on the hit TV show).
The cover story, "Grade B -- But Choice," is devoted to an obscure 1934 musical called "Young and Beautiful," featuring "budding starlets, grade-A character actors, grade-B musical numbers, a pair of vaudevillians, a look behind the scenes of Hollywood, bogus appearances by Charlie Chaplin and Buster Keaton and a script by Dore Schary" [later famous as a producer of films such as "Crossfire," "Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House," "They Live By Night" and "The Red Badge of Courage"].
Maltin describes "one of the most bizarre musical numbers ever staged, in which actors wearing full-face masks of major stars appear on stage together," along with the WAMPAS girls, beauties selected by the Western Association of Motion Picture Advertisers -- an organization that, between 1922 and 1934, chose an annual list of promising "Baby Stars," which included Clara Bow, Mary Astor, Fay Wray, Joan Crawford, Janet Gaynor, Lupe Valez, Jean Arthur (!), Ginger Rogers and Gloria Stuart.
These stars were not on display in "Young and Beautiful," however. (Betty Bryson, anyone? Dorothy Drake? Hazel Hayes? Lucile Lund? Neoma Judge?) Imagine this:
At first, youre not sure whether or not to believe your eyes; many of the caricature masks are quite good. Some of the performers adopt the actors' body language, and appear in costumes from the stars' most recent roles: John Barrymore as he appeared in "Reunion in Vienna," Wallace Beery as Pancho Villa from "Viva Villa," George Arliss as "The Iron Duke," Joe E. Brown in uniform from "Son of a Sailor," Eddie Cantor in costume from "Roman Scandals," along with Clark Gable, Maurice Chevalier, Adolphe Menjou, Jimmy Durante, Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton, Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy. After an introductory sequence, the bogus stars participate in a kind of elaborate parade with the WAMPAS lovelies.If that doesn't sound tantalizing, I don't know what will.
Believe it or not, "Young and Beautiful" is still available on VHS from Turner Classic Movies.
Thanks, Leonard! Here's to five -- or 55 -- more years of film fanaticism. You're right: "We movie nuts have to stick together..."
Well, I comment a lot on your blog and rarely do I get this excited about a post but you have restored my faith in humanity Jim Emerson. I absolutely love Leonard Maltin and said so on my own blog when writing about favorite critics. He was in the post scriptum but not because he was an after thought, only because I discovered him much later on than the others I mention. It's no secret to anyone visiting my blog or reading my comments littered around the other numerous blogs that I have a preference for films of the golden age and before. And Leonard Maltin is one of the few people out there that focuses on it rather than throwing it the occasional bone.
I have purchased some DVDs of old cartoons, Chuck Jones, and my favorite, the special release of Disney episodes of Tomorrowland from the fifties - I know, it sounds dry but it's not!. Anyway, I cherish Leonard's introductions as much as the DVDs themselves!
How wonderful that not everyone involved in the world of film criticism is cynical or jaded. It's nice to be cynical and jaded on occasion (I've made a few sour comments myself)but Leonard Maltin always seem fresh, optimistic and deeply, deeply in love with the movies.
Thanks so much for spotlighting him. Sometimes when we're all mired down in deep discussions about the meaning of criticism, the future of the online community, impeachment and the state of film in an increasingly high-tech age we forget about that pure unadulterated love of the movies that brought us all here in the first place. That's one thing Leonard never seems to forget.
Okay everyone can stop pointing now. I'll stop gushing and go back to being the usual Jonathan everyone's used to. But thanks again Jim and a very happy fifth to Leonard. I love his journal, his site, his online/offline newsletter. I hope it lasts another fifty.
I'll add a gush too (like Mr. Lapper):
There I was, a wee boy in the '80s, having seen Entertainment Tonight from its' inception, scowling and disagreeing with Maltin's take on "Tron" if I recall correctly.
I felt like sparring with Mr. Maltin many times during his ET reviews, like Siskel versus Ebert (or like a precocious brat).
Loving the guy! Hooray for analog newsletters too!
I've been a regular reader of Maltin's site for a few years, yet have NEVER subscribed to that newsletter. I may have to now.
His work on DVDs (especially the Disney Treasures series) is excellent.
And, years ago, before the internet, I wrote to him about an error I found in his movie guide. Soon after, I got a very nice letter from him personally, thanking me for my note and the entry was corrected in the next edition.
And I probably use his guide two or three times a day. More than I ever check the IMDB or other online resources. It still is the best.
So, a great critic. Glad you wrote the piece.
Trying to find some information on movies I believe were originally filmed in 3-D but released flat: "Witness to Murder", "Escape from Fort Bravo", "Scream" - the compositions in these films indicate standard 3-D techniques, yet no one ever lists them as 3-D films. And what's the brand name "Dimension Films" doing attached to "Scream"? Was this an attempt to revive 3-D once more? And there are those nagging foreground compositions in this movie, many of them looking as if they were borrowed directly from fifties' films such as "It Came from Outer Space."
Yours, Ray